Look, dear God, like my enemy
| Bach cantata | |
|---|---|
| Look, dear God, like my enemy | |
| BWV: | 153 |
| Occasion: | Sunday after New Years |
| Year of origin: | 1724 |
| Place of origin: | Leipzig |
| Genus: | cantata |
| Solo : | ATB |
| Choir: | SATB |
| Instruments : | 2Vl Va BC |
| text | |
| unknown, David Denicke , Paul Gerhardt , Martin Moller | |
| List of Bach cantatas | |
Look, dear God, like my enemy ( BWV 153) is a church cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach . He composed it in Leipzig for the Sunday after New Year 1724, January 2, 1724.
Story and words
In his first year in Leipzig, Bach wrote the cantata for the Sunday after New Year 1724. The prescribed readings were 1 Petr 4,12–19 LUT and Mt 2,13–23 LUT , the flight to Egypt. The unknown lyricist took the child murder in Bethlehem as an opportunity to shed light on the situation of Christians who are besieged by enemies. The poet is possibly the same one who wrote the Christmas cantatas Darzu the Son of God and See, what love the Father has shown us , immediately before , because three chorale stanzas appear in all of these works . The cantata begins with a chorale, the first stanza of David Denicke's show, Dear God, Like My Enemy (1646). Sentence 5 is the fifth stanza of Paul Gerhardt's Befiehl du seine Wege (1656), known as sentence 44 of the St. Matthew Passion . The words mention the most extreme enemies: “Even if all devils”. The cantata ends with stanzas 16 to 18 of the chorale Oh God, like some Herzeleid (1587), to which Martin Moller was ascribed. Bach later used this chorale as the basis for his chorale cantata Ach Gott, wie manches Herzeleid, BWV 3 , as well as the first stanza 1727 for Ach Gott, wie manches Herzeleid, BWV 58 .
Occupation and structure
The cantata is made up of chamber music with three soloists, alto , tenor and bass , four-part choir in the chorales, two violins , viola and basso continuo .
- Chorale: Look, dear God, like my enemy
- Recitativo (old): My dearest God, alas, let me have mercy
- Arioso (bass): Do not be afraid
- Recitativo (tenor): You speak, dear God
- Choral: No matter if all devils
- Aria (tenor): Just storm, storm, their gloomy weather
- Recitativo (bass): Confident! My heart
- Aria (old): Should I write my résumé
- Chorale: That's why I want to, because I'm still alive
music
The cantata begins with a four-part chorale, which is unusual for Bach's cantatas, but understandable when you consider that after BWV 40 , BWV 64 and BWV 190 this was the fourth new cantata for Christmas 1723 and BWV 65 followed for Epiphany . Bach might want to relieve his choir.
All recitatives are secco, accompanied only by continuo, but end as arioso . Bach called movement 3 an arioso, but it is almost an aria . The Bible word from Isa 4,10 LUT , "Do not be afraid, I am with you", is entrusted to Bass as the Vox of Christ , as if Jesus spoke it himself. The ritornello of eight bars is present in different keys for most of the movement.
Only two of the nine movements are arias. The first, movement 6, describes the enemies in fast violin passages, sharp dotted rhythms and bold harmonies. John Eliot Gardiner compares its intensity with the aria of Peter Oh, my meaning from the St. John Passion . The second aria, movement 8, is a minuet that Bach probably developed from his secular music to describe eternal joy. The instruments play a section twice and repeat it while the singing voice is woven into it. In the second vocal section, the words "My Jesus confuses suffering with blessed bliss, with eternal joys" are represented by a new theme called Allegro. Then the instruments repeat their second section as an aftermath.
Recordings
- The Bach Cantata Vol. 20 , Helmuth Rilling , Gächinger Kantorei , Bach-Collegium Stuttgart , Ann Murray , Adalbert Kraus , Walter Heldwein, Hänssler 1978
- JS Bach: Das Kantatenwerk - Sacred Cantatas Vol. 8 , Nikolaus Harnoncourt , Tölzer Knabenchor , Concentus Musicus Vienna , Stefan Rampf (soloist of the Tölzer Knabenchor), Kurt Equiluz , Thomas Hampson , Teldec 1985
- JS Bach: Complete Cantatas Vol. 9 , Ton Koopman , Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra & Choir , Bernhard Landauer , Christoph Prégardien , Klaus Mertens , Antoine Marchand 1998
- Bach Cantatas Vol. 17: New York , John Eliot Gardiner , Monteverdi Choir , English Baroque Soloists , Sally Bruce-Payne, James Gilchrist , Peter Harvey , Soli Deo Gloria 2000
- JS Bach: Cantatas Vol. 17 , Masaaki Suzuki , Bach Collegium Japan , Robin Blaze , Gerd Türk, Peter Kooij , BIS 2001
- JS Bach: Cantatas for the Complete Liturgical Year Vol. 4 , Sigiswald Kuijken , La Petite Bande , Elisabeth Hermans, Petra Noskaiová, Jan Kobow , Jan van der Crabben, Accent 2006
literature
- Alfred Dürr : Johann Sebastian Bach: The Cantatas. Bärenreiter, Kassel 1999, ISBN 3-7618-1476-3 and Deutscher Taschenbuchverlag, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-423-04431-4 .
- Werner Neumann : Handbook of the cantatas by JS Bach . 1947. 5th edition 1984, ISBN 3-7651-0054-4 .
- Hans-Joachim Schulze : The Bach Cantatas: Introductions to all of Johann Sebastian Bach's cantatas . Evangelische Verlags-Anstalt, Leipzig; Carus-Verlag, Stuttgart 2006 (Edition Bach-Archiv Leipzig), ISBN 3-374-02390-8 (Evang. Verl.-Anst.), ISBN 3-89948-073-2 (Carus-Verlag).
- Christoph Wolff , Ton Koopman : The world of Bach cantatas . Verlag JB Metzler, Stuttgart / Weimar 2006, ISBN 978-3-476-02127-4 .
Web links
- Look, dear God, like my enemy, BWV 153 : Sheet Music and Audio Files in the International Music Score Library Project
- Cantata BWV 153 Look, dear God, like my enemies in Bach Cantatas (English)
- BWV 153 Look, dear God, like my enemy on the Bach website
- BWV 153 Look, dear God, like my enemy Text, structure and cast on the personal homepage of Walter F. Bischof at the University of Alberta
- Julian Mincham: Chapter 34 BWV 153 Look, dear God, like my enemy . A listener and student guide . 2010 (english)
Individual evidence
- ^ A b c John Eliot Gardiner : Cantatas for the Sunday after New Year Gethsemanekirche, Berlin ( en , PDF) solideogloria.co.uk. 2008. Archived from the original on July 28, 2011. Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved December 22, 2010.
